Note: The author of this article is Xu Xiaocun (1954—), graduated from the Department of Chinese of Peking University, and once taught in the Department of Media Communication, College of Humanities and Development, China Agricultural University.
Mr. Wang Yao, a professor at Peking University, has an important research result in "On the History of Medieval Literature": During the Wei and Jin dynasties, Chinese realized the seriousness of death, which was the result of cultural progress. Therefore, the literati of the Wei and Jin dynasties first ate five stone powder in an attempt to prolong their lives. Later, I found out that it didn't work, so I drank desperately. Mr. Wang Yao said that they believe that since they cannot increase the length of life, they should increase the density of life.
With such research conclusions, coupled with Mr. Wang Yao's objective and rational attitude beyond ordinary people, he soberly thought about his own death. He once said, "I'm old now. If you don't do it, you sit still, and if you don't do it, you are dying. It's better to die than to sit still! ”
This passage is quite popular in a certain range, and it is one of the famous sayings created by Mr. Wang Yao. Mr. Wang Yao has said a lot of famous sayings in the style of "The World Speaks New Words", some of which are still quoted by people, and Mr. Wang Yao has been deceased for more than 30 years.
As Mr. Wang Yao's academic assistant, Qian Liqun also wrote an article after listening to this passage. The meaning of this passage is associated with "frozen out" and "burned out".
These two words are from Mr. Lu Xun's article "Dead Fire".
Lu Xun is really a genius, and he actually created an image of "dead fire" that is not in the world, contradictory, but rich in meaning.
It is fire, which has the shape of fire, the color of fire, and the flame of fire, but it is frozen in ice. If it is not given temperature, it will be "frozen out"; If you give it temperature, it will re-burn, but it will also "burn out". As Mr. Wang Yao said, "sit still" and "die throes".
Zhou Zuoren wrote a "Meditation on Death". The article is written quietly and peacefully, and it only talks about death as an abstract issue, and has nothing to do with my actual experience, so I can't say anything. In fact, he was very afraid of death, and after the Japanese occupied Beiping, he was assassinated once. According to later research, the assassin was a member of an anti-Japanese murder gang formed by a group of young students. Their weapons were too poor, the pistols were not lethal, and the bullet hit the clasp on Zhou Zuoren's chest, but it didn't penetrate. When the doctor told Zhou Zuoren that his life was not in danger, he jumped up with joy. It can be seen that his text and people are separated.
As people get older, they feel more clearly the imminence of death, and they are especially sensitive to this, especially writers.
In Sun Li's later years, the relevant institutions wanted to record the old writers and keep them as materials. The comer turned on the tape recorder and said, "Leave your voice." When Sun Li heard this, he felt very uncomfortable. Originally, this was a normal sentence, but in Sun Li's consciousness, it seemed to imply that he was going to die soon.
Sun Li's "Ten Kinds of Ploughing Hall After the Catastrophe" was published, and the publishing house made a letter and sent it to Sun Li. He saw the editor walk in with the book in his arms and thought, "Isn't this my urn?"
It can be seen that the shadow of death often hangs over Sun Li's heart. Even if you don't want to think about it anymore, it will still pop up unexpectedly, making you face, feel, and think.
When Wang Zengqi was seventy years old, he wrote a "Seventy Narratives". The article said: "I'm not too afraid of death, but when I enter my seventies, I always feel that there is a lot of hardship and helplessness." And he said, "They say that I will live to be ninety years old, but that is too long!" However, I don't have any serious organic diseases, and I will probably be okay for another ten years. …… To live, you have to do something. I hope to publish another collection of essays, a collection of short stories, to finish "Liao Zhai Xinyi" and, if possible, to write the long-awaited historical novel "Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty". In this way, it is almost there. "
He had a clear schedule of the rest of his time. When it was really time for his life to be in danger, he was also calm.
In 1997, Wang Zengqi was sent to the hospital for emergency treatment when his esophagus ruptured and hemorrhaged. He calmly said:
"Last night, it was over when I said it was over."
There was no panic at all.
He died a few days later. He was 77 years old.
When Shi Tiesheng was about twenty years old, his leg broke and he couldn't walk. Later, he developed kidney disease and was on dialysis three times a week. In the midst of this long and hopeless illness, he had more painful thoughts and feelings about death.
In his Retreat Notes, he wrote:
"How can death reduce so many pains, wishes, expectations, and perhaps happiness to a person so quickly, simply, and easily to zero? What is death? And the soul, where is the soul that just left?"
Even if you can't empathize, you can imagine how difficult it is for such a person who has been tormented by illness for decades to live. But he still hated death, which is why he could ask such a heart-rending question.
Yes, as soon as a person dies, the whole real world is no longer relevant to you. All your experiences, your joys and sorrows, and your inner longing, suddenly vanished and came to naught. Even if you can be famous through the ages, what does that "name" have to do with you? Not to mention those anonymous ordinary people, once they die, except for the memories that still exist among relatives and friends, it is as if they never existed.
Death is the greatest nothingness that man faces.
In the world, there are probably only a very small number of wise people and people with extremely strong vitality who can face death calmly.
Mr. Lu Xun died on October 19, 1936, after writing the article "Death" on September 5. According to the article, the doctor has announced that he will die. In the words of the common people, it is: "Death is not far away." But Mr. Lu Xun's article is still written calmly. We often think that Lu Xun's articles are short and sharp, and it is easy to ignore his twisted side.
The article starts with the printing of Kohlerhuich's prints and asking Smedley to write a preface, talking about Kollerhuich's theme of death in his forties, talking about the attitude of Chinese towards death, talking about their own illness, talking about wills, and talking about the famous sentence "Let them be resentful, and I will not forgive any of them." ……“
You can't fake the mentality of a person writing an article. Mr. Lu Xun knew that he would not be able to afford to be sick, and he wrote about death and arranged things after death, and he was still able to be leisurely, which shows that he is indeed a "casual party" who died.
Two days before his death, that is, on October 17, 1936, Mr. Lu Xun also wrote "Two or Three Things that Mr. Taiyan Remembered". Judging from the posthumous photos and face of Mr. Lu Xun after his death, he has lost so much weight that he can't look good. And yet he was still writing. It was as if death was a physical matter for the man named Lu Xun, and writing was his own business. The imminence of death did not affect Lu Xun's psychological state.
In the eyes of a layman like me, this almost inconceivable situation did not happen to Lu Xun alone. Professor Wang Furen is China's first Ph.D. in modern literature and an expert in Lu Xun studies. His doctoral dissertation, "A Mirror of the Anti-Feudal Ideological Revolution<呐喊><彷徨>: A Comprehensive Review", is considered a major breakthrough in Lu Xun's research in the new era. To say that he is the inheritor of Lu Xun's spirit is probably not rootless. When he was in his forties, he told me that if I knew I was going to be in the near future, I would go to a lecture. I was puzzled, is "lecturing" so important?
When Professor Wang Furen was in his seventies, he was diagnosed with a terminal illness. During his hospitalization in Beijing, he had to fly back to the south to give lectures. I am also a university teacher, and I know how much physical and energy it takes to give a lecture. But I also understood Professor Wang Furen, who wants to contribute all his knowledge to society. The day before he died, he was still reading a book on Russian literature.
Make every moment of your life count. This is probably the outlook on life of Mr. Lu Xun and the people affected by him.
Professor Wang Furen has written a very beautiful prose book - "The Sound of Cicadas and the Sound of Cows". I once told him that I wanted to compile a collection of excellent modern Chinese essays, and I would definitely include this book. Mr. Wang's sincerity, simplicity and deep affection for the working people, as well as his profundity and sharpness as a scholar, are rare to see. It's a pity that this collection of essays was read and drunk while I took to the restaurant for a drink, and I forgot it on the dinner table when I got drunk.
The attitude of Mr. Lu Xun and Professor Wang Furen towards death is a huge puzzle for me, what power did they use to transcend people's survival instinct and fear of death?
The complexity of life lies in the fact that human perceptual experience contains a more intrinsic essence of life. Can conclusions derived from reason change the natural sense of life?
There are probably only two kinds of people in the world who can face death calmly. One is the innate outlook, such as Wang Zengqi and Huang Yongyu. Wang Zengqi is tranquil and free, Huang Yongyu is optimistic and free, this all comes from nature and cannot be learned. The other is Lu Xun and Wang Furen, who have reached a higher level of thinking about life, so they can get rid of the shackles of life and emotion, and can overlook life and death and face it calmly.
From the point of view of natural human nature, the fear of death is not ridiculous. It's just that in the life journey of "living to die", it is rare for most people to get rid of a little fear of death.